AP PhotoIn this photo taken Feb. 18, 2010, downtown Detroit and Ford Field are seen from a window at the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects in Detroit.As Detroit Mayor Dave Bing moves forward with his plan to demolish up to 10,000 abandoned houses during his four-year term, it remains unclear what the city will do with its growing supply of vacant land.

One intriguing idea that continues to gain traction is the enactment of a local homestead act, offering immigrants land or citizenship in exchange for agreements to improve it or the city in some way.

"If you homestead, you
engage (people) into their community, not someone talking for them, me
or others," Hantz said.

In an op-ed piece published today, Phil Power of the Center for Michigan took the homestead concept further, proposing that Detroit offer a path to citizenship for wealthy immigrants who would agree to build a business in the city.

Powers said he met with several local leaders (who he agreed to keep anonymous) in Detroit several week ago, discussing the city's vacant land, the history of homesteading and its recent success in Vancouver, Canada, which offered wealthy Hong Kong residents citizenship China regained control of the region in 1997.

May 6, Record-Eagle: There's a clear lesson here for Detroit, now suffering population decline and the flight of an energetic and ambitious middle class: Let's create a new urban homestead program. Offer anybody with $1 million in assets who wants to move to Detroit the possibility of citizenship. Bring your million; get your work permit; start a business; stay five years. Bingo! You're an American citizen, participating in one of the most exciting urban redevelopment projects of our day.

Immigration, specifically the illegal variety, remains a hot-button issue in the United States for many who fear new arrivals will steal blue-collar jobs. But Power cites a recent New York Times report showing an unexpectedly high proportion of immigrants in large metropolitan areas are white-collar workers.

Among U.S. metro areas, Detroit ranks third, with no fewer than 59 percent of immigrants holding higher-paying jobs.

The bottom line: There is no way a foreign-born immigrant with $1 million in assets is going to take away Detroit residents' blue-collar jobs.

But if wealthy immigrants are welcomed to homestead and come and build businesses in Detroit, who's going to get the new jobs they create? Detroit residents.

What's your take: Would it work? Should Detroit offer a work permits to wealthy immigrants who agree to start a business in the city?